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Leisure Trends Group to be acquired by NPD

BOULDER, CO (BRAIN) — The NPD Group has agreed to buy Leisure Trends Group, a Boulder-based market research company that tracks retail and wholesale sales and inventory figures in the bike industry.

The NPD Group, based in Port Washington, N.Y., offers market research and consulting services to many industries and clients worldwide.

Jim Kelley, who was vice president and COO of Leisure Trends Group, has been named president of Leisure Trends, An NPD Group Company. Charlie Cooper, formerly president of Leisure Trends, will work with NPD through the end of the year, when he will take a management position at Boulder-based advocacy group PeopleForBikes. Leisure Trends will remain in Boulder, according to a letter sent to clients Tuesday morning.

The combined companies will collect sales data from more than 26,000 stores, in all channels including sporting goods, specialty stores, department stores, mass merchants, and e-commerce operations.

"This data collection footprint gives the combined company the broadest, most comprehensive look at retail sales available in the sports industry," NPD said in a press release.

Leisure Trends also conducts The Most Active Americans Panel, a consumer group of more than 2 million people who participate in online surveys.

Leisure Trends was founded in 1989 by Jim Spring and Bill Danner. The NPD acquisition does not include Leisure Trends’ Customer Relationship Management business. That business is being spun off as a separate company called Ascent CRM. This new company will be headed by Scott Buelter and will continue to service Leisure Trends’ existing CRM clients and contracts.

“Combining our complementary strengths will give us a new business greater than the sum of the parts,” said Dennis Brown, the group president of Americas Commercial Business for NPD. “Leisure Trends has deep ties in the industry, with strong retail partnerships and access to the ‘alpha consumer.' As we integrate our businesses, we will be able to offer new solutions for our clients as well as establish a strong platform for international growth.”